


How It's Always Been

by chucks_prophet



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angelic Possession, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Castiel Saves Dean Winchester, Dean Said Yes to Michael, Dean in Purgatory, End of the World, First Kiss, Hopeful Ending, Love Confessions, M/M, Possession, Purgatory, Sassy Castiel, Some Fluff, to quote Jeremy Carver on that last tag: ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-03-22
Packaged: 2019-04-06 09:09:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14053647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucks_prophet/pseuds/chucks_prophet
Summary: Dean freezes upon turning around. And that’s saying a lot, because you never freeze in Purgatory.





	How It's Always Been

**Author's Note:**

> For my friend Alyssa, who's probably more excited about reading this than I am to post it. ;P

“C’mon out, asshat!” Dean shouts into the seemingly never-ending timberland. Rainwater splashes against his boots. It’s a sound loud enough in a place like this to ring out across the humid land like a dinner bell, so Dean waits for the feast to commence. He grips his blade, slimy from the last Leviathan that nearly snatched it out of his hands like a sucker. “I know you’re here! Let’s fight man-to-man. Or, in your case, man-to-butt ugly monster!”

A howl unfetters from the trees, soon shadowed by multiple howls. Dean snaps his head up and around him. Werewolves.

He drops his head back down, but not in time to brace for the fall. With the Leviathan pinning him down, ugly mouth agape, he struggles to reach for his blade. Just as the thing dives for his face, none other than Dean’s blade collides with the Leviathan’s throat.

“Aggh,” Dean grunts getting back onto his feet. His calf is freshly skinned, but it doesn’t take long to heal. By the time he’s erect, it’s gone. “You know, for a vampire, you’re pretty slow. Julia Roberts here coulda—”

Dean freezes upon turning around. And that’s saying a lot, because you _never_ freeze in Purgatory.

He blinks a few times, thinking maybe this is a hallucination caused by the heat. But even his nightmares haven’t been this vivid. Or calm. In fact, it’s like every monster’s suddenly playing the quiet game. It doesn’t feel suspiciously quiet; just abnormally so. He’s waiting for the candid cameras to turn on him any second.

“Cas?”

Cas nods—just friggin’ _nods._ “Hello, Dean.”

“I…” Dean shifts a little in his stance and scoffs, which does little justice to how his body’s _actually_ handling it. His heart’s in the swimming part of a triathlon, diving straight into the pool of his stomach and soaking every part of his body. His head feels a little heavy too, and his eyes feel more like golf balls weighing precariously on their individual tees. “What’re you… _how_ are you—?”

“I’m not,” Cas answers for him. Judging by the empty but winding canals in his forehead, nothing’s changed since Dean last saw him. When was it… a few weeks ago? “Dean, I don’t have a lot of time,” he presses, dropping Dean’s blade, “you have to cast Michael out.”

“Michael?”

“The archangel Michael,” Cas says, squinting. It’s not his usual confused squint, though. It’s more of a concerned kind of squint, because his blue eyes widen the longer Dean takes to reply.

“Big Kahuna Michael?”

“You… don’t remember?”

Dean shakes his head and tries to think, but all that comes to mind is a few weeks ago, on that siren case with Sam and Cas. Dean and Cas split up and Cas looked _really_ good in that silver tuxedo with that white corsage and his hair combed back in a perfect brown wave for that wedding they had to crash and Dean had the excuse to look at him since they went undercover as a married couple—“The siren case in Atlanta,” he replies, summarizing the _important_ parts of his thoughts.

“Dean,” Cas starts carefully, “is that the last thing you remember?”

“Well, yeah…” _Partly because you looked kinda hot._

It’s Cas’s turn to shake his head. “Dean… that was nine _years ago.”_

For the first time since being here, Dean feels the wind getting knocked out of him. “What?”

“Dean, nine years ago, you said yes to Michael,” Cas explains. “And since Sam said no to Lucifer, Michael infiltrated the earth with the angels. Leagues of them. It was a form of population control. Millions of…”Cas pauses amidst his marathon speech to swallow something thick in his throat. Pain, probably. Regret. Guilt. Things Dean _was_ all-too familiar with before coming back to Purgatory (or, rather, fake Purgatory) and gets reintroduced to seeing Cas’s face again. “It’s too late now,” he says, sucking in a breath. “We’re beyond saving.”

“Why?” Dean asks, feeling his face grow hot, “Why come for me then?”

“We’ve been tracking you—tracking Michael down for almost a decade,” Cas urges, blue eyes practically shoveling into Dean’s tunnel-vision greens, like he’s holding out to find a light at the end of it: “Sam needs you. _We_ need you.”

“ _No one_ needs me!” Dean rages. “Hell, without me, there’d be a _lot_ more people alive right now!” Dean sighs, suddenly exhausted—also for the first time in a long time. “Don’t you get it, man? I’m no good. Never have been, never will be. Not for Mom, or Dad, or Sam, and _definitely_ not for you—” Dean scrubs a hand over his dirty face. Cas’s eyes glistening with tears just proves his point. “You know what? Let him keep me. Let me be helpful to someone before the glam fades. ‘s good seeing you, Cas.”

“Dean, you friggin’ ass.”

“What?” Dean grumbles, turning to face Cas again, because walking away can never be so easy. Not for the Winchesters. Never for the Winchesters.

“I can’t believe you’re making me do this,” Cas rants, and then his hand is on Dean’s left shoulder, spinning him around like he’s nothing, like he’s opening a can, causing the tees holding up Dean’s eyes to tear from the ground completely.

Then Cas smashes his lips on his.

Before Dean can find his footing and reciprocate, a white ball of light envelopes them. The next thing he knows, he’s in a in a cabin surrounded by the familiar smell of holy fire smoke with Sam looming over him.

“Hey, hey!” he yells, hitting the floor after the flames go out. His familiar melon hands are on Dean’s shoulders, shaking him like a maraca: “Dean! Are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” Dean mumbles, waving him off. “I see you’re still a little bitch.”

Sam scoffs despite the tears rolling down his flushed cheeks. He still looks exactly the same, his forehead only somehow _more_ pronounced and his hair longer. “And after nine years of possession, you’re still a giant jerk.”

“You can take the man outta the dick, but you can’t take the dick outta the man,” Dean states. Before he has time to retract those words, however, he’s pointing straight ahead. “Cas.”

“Wha—? Oh crap!” Sam rushes to Cas’s aid, who’s nearly about to face-plant into the wooden floorboard. “Hey, buddy, you okay?”

Cas grips his head with the hand not wrapped around Sam’s shoulder. “Yeah, I’m… I’m okay.”

“Ah, I see you guys hooked up while I was gone,” Dean comments. “Gotta say, I’m not surprised.”

“Where’s Michael?” Sam asks. Again, after nine years, he’s still unfazed by Dean’s lamely disguised jokes.

“Where we don’t need to worry about him anymore,” Cas retorts. Sam pulls up a chair for him across from Dean before setting him down. “At least not until he convinces a stranger to temporarily say yes to him. But I don’t know who’d be _stupid_ enough to do such a thing.”

As weak as he is, Dean’s still able to roll his eyes at Cas.

“Good enough for me,” Sam responds. “So, how did you convince my stubborn ass brother to come back to the living?”

Dean’s face flushes. Luckily, Cas is quick to respond. Still looking at Dean, a small smile finds his equally tired face: “I just told him how it is… how it’s _always_ been.”

 


End file.
